


Within the Words

by pagerunner



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/M, Perc'ahlia, other characters namechecked
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-02
Updated: 2016-05-02
Packaged: 2018-06-05 21:24:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6724108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pagerunner/pseuds/pagerunner
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While searching for clues that might help them on a mission, Vex encounters a book in a language she can't read...and so she turns to the one ally who can. Perc'ahlia vignette.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Within the Words

The book is a slight little thing, its pages delicate and the cover worn, and it looks as though its secrets have been left to languish for years.

In Vex’s hands, those secrets are frustratingly inert. No matter how many languages she speaks—and she’s familiar with a good half-dozen, thank you very much—this one is beyond her. When she flips the book open to study the graceful script within, her lips make a much less elegant curl. Then she looks up, searching the room.

“Percival?” she calls, and waits to see him round a corner, making his way to her through a maze of dusty bookshelves.

Those shelves mark out the corridors of an old, almost-forgotten library, one tucked away in a tower in a deserted corner of town. It had avoided the devastation of the dragons, although only just. The last few stragglers in town had pointed Vox Machina toward it, saying that if any knowledge was left that might aid in their journey, it would be found there, and then they’d gone, too, leaving the party very much alone in this oddly haunted space. The last Vex had seen of Grog—he who had no use for a library, after all—he’d installed himself as a rather grumpy guard, with Pike at his side to keep him company. Scanlan had grown distracted with a collection of bawdy stories, Vax had begun studying maps with his usual single-minded intensity, and Percy and Keyleth had gone off to…

 _Well_ , Vex thinks, _whatever it is Percy and Keyleth do while researching._

She feels an odd little pang at that. It’s not exactly jealousy, since what is there to be jealous of? But their rapport is something that’s difficult to share. For all that Percy and Keyleth can be at odds, can dispute their plans or matters of morality, they’re often in accord in other ways. Vex has seen them take up a corner in Percy’s workshop with their respective books and stay at it for hours, content with the quiet company.

Vex…isn’t much good at that sort of quiet. Reader though she may be, she wants to _do_ things, too, wants to get her hands into it. So when it comes to this kind of research, she’s been restless. For the last hour she’s been paging through book after book for clues and leaving the rejected volumes in piles all around her. When Percy finds her, he raises his eyebrows at the scene, and all right, she supposes it does make a picture. She’s perched halfway up a ladder with one of Keyleth’s druidcrafted lights bobbing over one shoulder, its illumination gentle but burnishing everything in sight, and she’s surrounded by teetering towers of books while she flips through the fragile pages of another, as if she might be able to decode the text if she just glares at it intensely enough.

For Percy’s part, he’s carrying one large volume with his left hand and adjusting his glasses with his right, and Vex sees a glint of warm gold reflected from the frames. It fully raises her gaze again. For a moment, looking at him there, she’s caught.

It’s the effect of Keyleth’s lantern, she tells herself. That’s all it is. Because there’s something that can be so wintry about Percy, but in this light…

“Have you found something?” he asks, bringing her back to the present. Vex considers both her answer and the book in her hands.

“Possibly, but I admit I need some…assistance.”

His lips quirk at how begrudging she sounds. “And going by your enthusiasm, clearly I was your first choice.”

“Oh, shush, silly, it’s not that. And you _are_ my first choice.” She hops down, lighting just beside Percy, who gives her another, intrigued little glance. She gestures at the book. “This is in Celestial, isn’t it?”

“I…yes. Yes, it is. May I?”

“Of course.” She passes it over. Percy sets aside his own book to give hers attention, cradling it with more care than she had. Vex nudges him as he studies it. “What’s it called? Is it about the Vestiges?”

“Not specifically. It’s more…legends, it seems, and…hmm. Where did you find it?” He pauses, side-eyeing the discarded books. “In the middle of all this mess _,_ presumably.”

Vex grimaces. “I’ve been finding a lot of tall tales and poetical nonsense. But I was hoping there was something more to this one.”

“There would almost have to be. There aren't many primary sources written in this script, more just fragments left behind. I expect it’s been collated from various sources…”

“Yes, but what does it _say?”_

“Patience, Vex’ahlia.” The corners of his mouth lift with amusement, her full name deliberate and his tone almost teasing. Then he turns a page, flips it back, points at something. “There’s a number of names here, tales of deeds…”

“Like what? What’s this bit? It looks like this word recurs.”

She nudges closer again, gesturing at the nearest page. Percy briefly looks taken aback at the interruption, but it seems he’s beginning to get a notion of what she’s after. “Yes, it’s a reference to a weapon. The same one each time, I think. But this character at the end, the one that alters every time it’s written—that indicates changing power.”

“So is it getting weaker or stronger?”

“Stronger. It seems to be improved in some fashion. But no, it doesn’t say how.”

“Curious,” she murmurs. “And then….”

She’s leaning close enough that she can feel it when he speaks. “It’s speaking of a battle. A high and exalted power facing a mighty adversary, in a confrontation that…” He pauses. “ _Aistareth elsar i phiren._ That shook the earth and sky.”

He looks back at her when she doesn’t reply. In fact, she’s just caught her breath.

She’d known that Percy could read Celestial, but somehow she hadn’t quite imagined him _speaking_ it. When he does, his proper, cultured voice softens a little, his cadence lilting. It’s so arresting that Percy has to call for her attention.

“Vex, what is it?” he asks softly.

She steps back, shakes herself. “Nothing,” she murmurs, still hearing echoes of that foreign phrase. “I was distracted. Just…how did you learn this language in such detail, Percy? It’s not a common skill.”

He lowers the book, distracted in his own right. “Well. I…read a lot when I was young, which I’m certain is no surprise.” He gives a crooked smile. “I toyed with a number of languages, but Celestial fascinated me. Maybe it was the allure of the beings who originally spoke it. It was a romantic idea, I suppose. Or pretentious.”

“Oh, well. _That’s_ something you’ve never been, so…”

He snorts, more genuinely amused this time. It fades, though, into a stranger expression. “Either way, there I was, determined to learn the most obscure thing that I could. I spent hours deciphering an old text that we owned. Eventually my tutor took notice. He entertained the notion, helped fill in the gaps.”

Something pricks at Vex’s memory. “Wait. Your tutor…?”

His voice lowers. “Professor Anders.”

“Oh.” The details flood back in like dark smoke. “Oh, shit. I’m sorry, Percy, I didn’t think…”

His gaze drops back to the book. Vex blinks hard to dispel the memory of him staring at the gun in his hands instead, Professor Anders’ name burning off the barrel. “It’s all right,” Percy says levelly. “It was a very different time. And I learned.” His voice shades just slightly sardonic. “I learned.”

She swallows. Looking at him now, Vex feels herself losing interest in the information she’s supposed to be searching for. She puts one hand to his shoulder. He might be wearing multiple layers, but she still feels the warmth there— _reminds_ herself of the warmth there, the reality of Percy as he is—and watches him turn to her.

“Read me some more,” she says, gently entreating. “I’ve never gotten to hear much of it before. And I’d like to learn it, too.”

He studies her as intently as he’d been reading the book. “And there might be clues.”

She waves the other hand. “Yes, and there might be clues.”

For a moment he says nothing. Finally there’s the faintest hint of a smile. “Sit with me, then?”

He gestures to the window, whose sill is just wide enough for the both of them. Vex settles there with the light still hovering helpfully over one shoulder. She supposes she’s advertising their presence by letting it linger so near the glass, but there’s also something oddly comforting about it, to say nothing of the practical need, so she’s not going to send it away. Besides, it strikes her anew that Percy had come to her without his own. When he takes off his coat, hooks it over a ladder rung, and sits beside her, she nudges the light around to bring him out of shadow. The contact makes her fingertips tingle. The warmth in his expression makes that feeling pleasantly spread.

“What part would you like me to read?” he asks.

She shrugs a little, letting her shoulder brush against his. “Any of it. Anything useful.” She pauses, her tone softening. “Anything you like.”

That fleeting smile of his returns. With that he returns to the page they’d read before, beginning the translation again. He sounds more relaxed now, occasionally pausing to explain a word or turn of phrase. Vex finds herself struck by both the beauty and the strangeness of the sound: the language of the angels, from someone who’s had to speak so closely with the darkness.

She breathes in deeply, a little shakily, and rests her head against his shoulder. It makes his breath hitch, too. “Keep reading, Percival,” she murmurs. “So many things to learn yet.”

He’s quiet for a moment before he says, “ _Sa’verre,_ Vex’ahlia.”

“Sa’verre….”

“Of course.”

She feels a gentle brush against her hair, something almost like a kiss. Before she can remark on it, even react to it, it’s over. Percy sits back up, adjusts his glasses, and keeps on reading.

And Vex, discovering that she’s perfectly content after all to enjoy the quiet when it’s with him, settles in to listen.


End file.
